Cyanogenic Specter
by thallata
Summary: Holden's brain is the perfect radio for the static that was Detective Miller. He can't tell the signal from the noise sometimes, but what he's really worried about is what it means that he can tune to it at all.


After Eros, Holden had a certain distaste for the color blue. After the protomolecule. After Miller died.

But that was nothing to how much he came to hate it after Miller came back.

Specifically he hated that blue Cherenkov glow that accompanied Miller's appearance. Every time, out of the corner of his eye, he would see the little balefireflies swirl and condense until ex-Miller would snap into being. The rich scents of esters and acetone would slowly slide in as well, as though somehow a smell could be out of focus. It might be better if the detective had been more of a marionette, a clear puppet of the protomolecule, like he claimed. But usually Holden just saw that asshole belter who had shot an unarmed man and saved a world.

Every damn time he would try and remind himself this wasn't the real Miller. It wasn't even a person. But each time he forgot. Sometimes at night, curled up against Naomi he would wonder if not-Miller made him forget.

After the Slow Zone, he had the ship scan him, looking for changes, alterations since Eros. Since Ganymede. It didn't show anything. He made Naomi read it too, just in case. She had asked "In case of what?" but humored him with worry in her eyes.

Once, months later, they were celebrating after a mission at a bar on some rock. He ordered Ganymede gin. He ordered it most places in the Belt now. The fungal overtones in what passed for whiskey out here always rubbed him the wrong way. They tasted more familiar to him than what he remembered bourbon was supposed to taste like. The gin worried him too, because he was sure he used to hate gin. But at least he didn't seem to have two memories of how it was supposed to taste.

"You know, I only asked for a bottle of that gin because it's so damn expensive," un-Miller said when Holden was making his way back to the Roci. The rest of the crew had split up hours ago, so Miller was his only company.

"Why do you keep coming back?" Holden asked. He was drunk enough he wasn't scared of Miller's answer.

"We need to talk," was all he said, before exploding into a storm of fireflies as a technician hurried to her shift down the corridor. The strong scent of artificial bananas and organic solvents followed him all the way home. He told himself the station just needed fresh air filters.

Holden began going to elaborate lengths to keep from being alone. On the long hauls between ports though, it was impossible not to spend some by himself. With Miller.

On the way back to Tycho, Naomi had made it clear that she didn't care where he went, as long as he didn't come back for at least a full day-night cycle. Amos had pre-emptively locked himself in engineering, and it would take Naomi's cooperation to pry him out again against his will, at least without casualties. Alex was asleep, and had threatened that a pilot deprived of sleep again because some captain was lonely was likely to 'accidentally' fly them into the nearest hazard. Holden grit his teeth and headed to his station. Maybe Miller wouldn't come. He didn't always, especially if they were far enough from anywhere the protomolecule had been entrenched.

He settled himself in his chair and shut his eyes as blue started to flicker around the edges of his vision. Petulantly, he kept them squeezed shut as the familiar background smellscape of the Roci shifted to something alien and strange. Like an explosion in a nail polish factory. Like a lightning storm of xylenes. He was annoyed to find that even behind his eyelids, Miller smirked at him.

"We need to talk," the dead detective said, as he often did. With his eyes closed, Miller actually looked more real than when they were open. He shuddered as he saw and felt Miller reach out to put a hand on his shoulder, and opened his eyes in panic. Miller had never touched him before. He was sure he couldn't touch him, something about processing power and the limitations of the meat.

"When you close your eyes, there's less input to balance. More senses can be worked in," Miller explained, unasked. He looked sad, as though he regretted breaking physical contact. Even though Miller no longer had a body. Holden certainly hoped he didn't, at least not one anywhere near his ship.

"What do we need to talk about?" Holden ground out.

"Something killed the assholes pulling my strings. I need to know what that was," the detective answered. Holden was surprised, Miller was rarely so blunt. Usually it was all metaphors and allusions. Doors and Corners.

"Ok, go do that."

"Can't. I need you to go, to take me there. I can't reach where I'm not already, it doesn't work like that."

"Then get someone else to take you," Holden said, turning away. Miller just drifted into view again, this time in Naomi's chair. He suppressed the irrational urge to ask the detective to move.

"Can't," then a long pause, "We need to talk."

Holden hated it when not-Miller looped. He tried ignoring Miller for hours. He tried not to blink too much, in case Miller tried to touch him again. Eventually, desperate, he tried to change the subject.

"Fine. Fine. We need to talk, let's talk. What's your favorite color? What's Venus like? How bout them Cubs?" Holden asked, deploying conversational chaff in hopes of distracting the detective. For the first time since Miller had grabbed him, the projection's eyes focused on him, seeing him.

"The Cubs. What the fuck do you think I know about the Cubs?" he asked incredulously, "Fuckin' Earthers and your fuckin' outdoor sports." Miller made a Belter gesture indicating he should go fuck himself, but somehow more rude.

"So not baseball then? Uhh... how about, um. That thing, the what do you call it, the low-grav squash thing?"

"Never had much time for sports," Miller said rubbing his face, suddenly more present than he had been. The smells shifted towards a well-worn station, the smell of air breathed a thousand times by a thousand people.

"Was more of a casino guy, when I had the scrip," Miller added, eventually.

"Yeah, well, I remember that pretty well about you," Holden said as he wondered if that was Miller, or his memories of Miller causing the projection to claim that. He tried not to remember Eros, hiding as their cells melted into soup. The man they killed as the gambling machines played a mindlessly happy tune. The desperation and the stink of the fear and volatile organics.

"For what it's worth I'm sorry," Miller said, either sensing or guiding the direction of his thoughts, "You were such a boy scout, I didn't realize how hard it would be for you."

"Stay out of my head," Holden growled, turning away again. This time Miller didn't follow his line of sight. Instead he heard Naomi's chair creak as though Miller were leaning back against it.

"Can't," Miller said sadly, "We need to talk."

"No, no we really don't. You like casinos so much, we can play cards or something."

He looked at Miller, who was staring off into space. Slowly the projection nodded, and suddenly the Roci just smelled like home.

"We can do that. You'll lose, but we can play. You'll have to close your eyes."

He hesitated. Get in a situation where Miller could physically interact with him, or spend 4 more hours ignoring the detective's repetition. Shuddering, Holden closed his eyes, and behind his eyelids Miller sat at a table across from him. He felt a slight headache as his eyes darted behind his lids, trying to fill in the rest of the space.

"Stop that. Just relax, and look straight ahead," Miller said as he picked up a deck and began to shuffle, "You know Bourré?"

"No."

"Then I'll teach you, it works like this..."

They played for the rest of his shift, in the darkness behind his eyes. Holden lost most games. The ones he won, he thought the Miller had let him win, but he wasn't sure. When Alex arrived, heralded by the smell of coffee, Miller vanished before he even opened his eyes.

During the downtime at Tycho, the crew was eating dinner together and playing cards. It was Holden's turn to pick the game and he called Bourré. He didn't know why.

"I didn't think anyone really played that on Earth," Naomi said, the curiosity clear in her voice.

"Miller taught me," he admitted. His crew looked at him uncomfortably. They knew he meant ex-Miller. He won handily, though they weren't playing for any stakes.

On the next run they tried not to leave him alone. It didn't last, but Holden appreciated the effort.

* * *

Before Holden agreed to take the Rocinante to one of the new worlds, Miller was like a voicemail. Show up, tell him he needed to talk, say go through the gate, repeat. It made it easier to ignore him, which was nice. It made Holden worry about what had happened to Miller, which was irrational. He had already died, everything from there was probably downhill.

After he agreed to go to Ilus, Miller stopped looping as much. Sometimes it would be like when they played cards, and they had actual sort-of-conversations. A few times they played again, Holden and Miller taking turns picking the game. Once Miller sat with him and watched a depressing Belter movie, crying when the lovers floated out to die in the void together. It was harder and harder to remember that he wasn't real during those visits.

Other times it was easier, like when he would never quite come into focus, the blue blobs of light joining and splitting, his voice static and feedback. Occasionally Miller would pull him somewhere else in the time between blinks, somewhere vast and alien, and ask for a human perspective on something. Once Miller held his consciousness in the not-place of the nexus and made him watch the stars go out one by one. Dark sinuous things that Miller couldn't see swam in the darkness, and Holden had threatened to hold his breath until he passed out if the detective didn't take him back. Holden hated these trips, when he came back to himself his body always felt so... limiting, so fragile.

Somehow, the worst times were when Miller would just appear and watch him. Those times were uncomfortable. Miller would just stare at him, like a spider at something insignificant and tasty caught in its web. For weeks straight it happened every time he was alone, and Holden got to the point he couldn't even shower without the not-Miller dissecting him with its eyes. Miller watching him undress, watching him in the shower was so unsettling, he actually stopped bathing. Eventually his crew threatened to mutiny unless he 'did something about the smell' so he gave up and just showered with his clothes still on. Miller watched him the whole time, even when Holden tried to concentrate on the incongruities of the two of them fitting in the tiny shower. All he got for his troubles was a headache and a nosebleed. Not-Miller watched the blood dripping down his face like it wanted a taste. The blue glow spread to encompass the whole room, and his shower smelled like ether: fragrant and dizzying. The lights flickered and not-Miller leaned closer, the eyes cyan from side to side, impossible geometries swirling in their depths. He was unable to look away as the Miller-thing began to extend its hand. Holden was suddenly terrified the detective was going to touch him. He fled, contorting so as to not touch the man who wasn't there.

Miller disappeared in a fanfare of static when Holden bust into the hallway, knocking into Amos. The ether smell stuck around, and Holden forced himself not to ask if Amos smelled it. He already knew the answer.

"You ok, cap?" Amos asked, something approximating worry in his tone, as he looked down at the soaking wet ship's knits the captain was wearing.

"He won't go away," Holden said, running a shaking hand through his wet hair, "He just keeps watching me."

"I can see how that might be unsettlin'," Amos said pleasantly, an amiable smile not reaching his eyes, "Maybe next time you invite Naomi in there before it gets this bad?"

"Oh. Yeah. I should have thought of that..." The stress was getting to him. He didn't want to impose even more on his crew, but Amos was right. They would help him if he asked. He just didn't want to have to ask. He should be able to handle a little staring by a ghost.

"I'm sure you would have eventually cap. Try not to let that undead son of bitch drive you too crazy. Tell him I say 'hi'," Amos said, patting Holden on the arm as he walked away, whistling tunelessly.

Holden was relieved when Miller didn't come back after Amos turned the corner. In fact he was conspicuously absent until they had almost reached the ring into the Ilus system. That night, Holden took watch. For thirty minutes, individual blue fireflies danced around him, drifting completely opposite the air circulation. Holden restrained himself from trying to swat them when they got too close. Eventually he heard Miller settle in behind him, the scent of formaldehyde strong in the air.

"Let me guess, we need to talk?" Holden asked, with less anger than he would have given the question a few weeks ago. He still didn't turn to face him though. He didn't want to see if the twisting structures behind Miller's eyes were still there. He had been dreaming about them.

"I'm sorry."

"Are you capable of being sorry?" he asked, turning to look. Miller looked different. A different outfit. A new hat. Same stupid haircut though. He slouched the way real-Miller would have, like a person. Holden was weirdly relieved to see a holstered gun at his side. Not-Miller didn't bother with the details during the bad times.

"That was a bad iteration. You hooked more of the pendejo puppet masters than usual. Less of... me," he said, not really answering the question. Miller folded his arms, and looked uncomfortable. Shame was an interesting expression on him, Holden didn't think he had ever seen it on him in the flesh.

"Go haunt someone else for awhile," he said, turning and dismissing both the detective and his apology.

"Can't."

"Really can't, or won't?" Holden asked, torn between annoyance and curiosity. He turned back to frown at Miller. He didn't actually wish the detective on anyone else, but he was getting tired of being the only one having to deal with Miller's bullshit.

"Really Can't. Sorry."

"Why? You said you only appear to me because Miller sort of liked me. But now you say **can't** show up for someone else?"

"When I died, I was thinking of Julie. I was thinking about the Belt. I was thinking about you. When my masters reached out from Venus, Julie was gone. They Belt had forgotten me. But you, you matched a pattern for Miller. And once we... connected... we found Miller matched a pattern for you. Using your brain, and what was left my sorry ass, they build a Miller. A machine to find things. To investigate. They've had to build a few over the years. The best ones, the ones that work, they need what they have, but they also need what you have. Each time it reaches out to you and you reach back to it I die and I live and I die again. And at this point... I can't reach anyone else. Well, anyone who isn't part of the network."

"I'm not really part of the network, right. Right?" he asked with desperation. Visions of the ribcage dragging itself through Eros floated in his vision, and the smell of formaldehyde grew stronger. Blue fireflies danced between them, multiplying and chittering with the static of a thousand dead.

"No. Not exactly. You just, well, your brain's maybe got some unique wrinkles."

"What?!" Holden yelped.

"Every time we do this. Every time we talk, the next time is easier. That sort of thing leaves a mark."

"What the hell did you do to my brain?" Holden angrily demanded, reaching out to shake Miller. He was almost unsurprised when he was able to do so.

"Nothin' bad," Miller explained, patting Holden condescendingly on the cheek.

"Can you undo it?" he demanded.

Miller gave a Belter shrug, and pushed Holden off. He took his time straightening his shirt, before smiling smugly at Holden.

"Might be able to. But I won't. It ain't hurting you. And I need it. **We** need it. Bleed through is minimal, and within acceptable parameters. You'll be fine."

"You mean, I'll be fine within 'acceptable parameters,'" Holden growled.

"Yeah, that's what I said. You should be happy; you don't know how much work I had to do to define acceptable parameters as 'sane and human,'" Miller said, the fireflies restless between them. The scent of formaldehyde edged into the pure clear burn of methanol.

"Explain bleed through," he demanded angrily, backing away from the fireflies. They seemed more real than they had just a few moments ago.

"Weeeell," ex-Miller said, taking off his hat and running a hand through his hair, "There's maybe a little bit of me kickin' around in you these days. Not much, maybe a stray memory or two. A little personality slant towards Miller-ish. You know, not much more than you would get from normal human interactions. Just a little more… involuntary."

At least the bastard had the good grace to look embarrassed. This explained some of the weird reactions he had been having, like the gin. Like the weird familiarity with Belter creole. Like his itchy trigger finger.

"Get. It. Out."

"Again, sorry, but I can't. And yeah, for what it's worth I can be sorry. So I'm sorry about the last me. I'm sorry about your brain. And I'm sorry that I'm going to have to come back again and again and again until I have fulfilled my purpose. Aloha Holden. I'll be seeing you on the other side."

The fireflies whirled together into a vortex as the menthol switched to the old yeasty smell of spilled Belter whiskey. With a sound like stars screaming and a million nails on a dry ice blackboard Miller vanished.

Holden spent the rest of the shift trying not to panic. Once Amos relieved him, he strapped himself into the medbay, and underwent the most thorough brain scan he could convince the machine to do. He was still trying to get the machine to compare the results to previous tests when Naomi walked in.

"Miller back then?" She asked taking the screen out of his hands and sorting the results for him.

"Yeah. He said he fucked around with my brain. But he apologized, so I guess that's something." He narrowly restrained himself from snatching the tablet back from Naomi.

"He give you any kind of specifics for what you're looking for?"

"He mentioned 'a few new wrinkles' so I'm hoping it's subtle. I mean, if there were big changes we would have seen sooner, right?" he ask desperately. Namoi just touched him reassuringly before going back to refine her search. Holden waited impatiently, struggling to remain still.

"Well, the bad news is that we don't have another scan of this level of detail to compare it to. Possibly if was asked the Earth Navy for your records we could look. The good news is that yeah, there's nothing that autodoc is calling out as weird." She handed him the screen so he could see for himself.

He wished the lack of any big changes reassured him. But Eros had instantaneously changed vectors without any change in perceived gravity. They were currently flying through a starless void that he was pretty sure wasn't part of the universe. He wasn't going to put it past Miller to have made major changes to his brain that were undetectably small.

"Do you want me to send a request for your records?" Naomi gently asked.

"No. No, I'll be ok," Holden said, forcing a smile for her sake.

She kissed him slowly and gently before pushing off to go to her station. Holden sat with the autodoc for a long time, squinting at every little shadow, trying to figure out if it was the same as before.

* * *

After they crossed the Ring and approached Ilus, for the first time, he sought out Miller. He demanded more details about how the detective kept finding him.

The conversation had not gone well. At least now he knew the answer wasn't some secret brain structure the protomolecule had grown. But when he got back from the planet he was going to rip apart the entire ship to find that damn node. The only thing keeping him going was the promise of an after. That there would be an After Miller.

Ilus didn't go well either. Though the worst part wasn't the blindness. It wasn't the insanity of the security forces either. It wasn't the explosion that almost certainly touched off a decade-long winter. It wasn't even having to listen to Naomi getting captured or sitting at the bottom of a gravity well that was doing its best to destroy his ship and his family. No, the worst, implausibly, impossibly, was Miller. And after.

Miller-bot was something of a surprise. Though the ease with which he accepted that as Miller was upsetting. A lot about the facility was upsetting. He wasn't sure if Miller was doing something, or if protomolecule not grown from people smelled different, but the facility just smelled like the Roci to him. The strange shapes of the structures echoed those that had been in the eyes of the bad not-Miller. Being there had been like walking into the dream of a childhood home he had never lived in. The blue fireflies danced around them, seemingly overjoyed.

When he had to leave Dr. Okoye with Miller-bot to deal that that asshole Murtry, he wasn't sorry. The looks she had been giving them were upsetting. He understood her desire to study the protomolecule and its leavings, but he didn't like she was studying him the same way.

He didn't expect to feel it when the protomolecule went crazy, but it was like someone kicked him in the chest. When the fireflies turned into a violent swarm, he dragged Murtry to safety. Holden was looking around for some kind of weapon as everything that was thrashing menacingly towards them froze for a fraction of a second, then stampeded off. Everything was headed back towards where he had left Miller and Okoye. Murtry must have passed out, because suddenly Miller was in front of him.

"You look terrible." It was true; the detective was bleeding fluid that was somehow both red and cyan at once from an upsetting number of wounds. Even while he was standing there, the Miller before him snarled and lost an arm. It shifted into a swarm of the blue fireflies as it fell. They swirled around Holden, almost protectively.

"No shit. I don't have a lot of time. The doctor's gonna drag me through the eye of an angry god in a sec. I've got kind of a suicide pact going with everything left here, so they're trying to stop me. That should lift the lockdown, but I need you to do something for me."

"What?" Holden asked suspiciously. Miller suddenly looked past him and shuddered.

"Shit, no time," Miller said as he lunged forward and wrapped his remaining arm around Holden. Without warning, the detective kissed him. If something so clinically devoid of passion could be called that; it felt like Miller was trying to eat his face. Something that felt like mandibles forced his lips open, as what seemed like hundreds of worm-like tentacles filled his mouth. Holden thrashed and tried to fight off the ghost, but Miller just moved with him. The fireflies that had surrounded them began sinking into his skin as he struggled to get away from Miller. Abruptly he found himself pulled into the darkness, to a normal, put together Miller standing before him. He was wearing the stupid hat again. Holden immediately punched him in the mouth.

"Sorry. I can't let you stop this." The detective looked genuinely sad. He just stood there as Holden punched him over and over. It didn't seem to have an effect.

"If it makes you feel better, what I'm giving you should keep humanity safe. When the time comes."

"It doesn't make me fucking feel better!" Holden yelled, "What the fuck are you doing to my body?"

"It's an insurance policy. I'm sorry Boy Scout, but this is the way it has to be. See you on the other side." abruptly the Miller in front of him shifted, and for the first time since he came back Holden felt like he was looking at the real Miller, "I didn't want to… I'm sorry. I'm so sor-"

Miller abruptly cut off and Holden found himself flat on his back, looking up at a suddenly silent facility. Murtry was still passed out next to him.

Holden desperately patted himself down, trying to figure out what Miller had done before he disappeared. He paid careful attention to the inside of his mouth, but everything felt the same. Finding Okoye, getting out of the facility, getting Amos stabilized all helped keep him from panicking. After several days with no differences in how he felt, looked, and was perceived by others appeared, and Holden started to relax. Maybe Miller hadn't gotten a chance to finish whatever it was. Maybe it would show up at the worst possible time.

He got Okoye to test him for protomolecule contamination; it was negative. He then got her to compare scans now to the extensive sets they had run on him to cure the blinding agent. Everything showed no changes. Slowly, he relaxed. Not enough to answer her questions, but she wouldn't talk about the god eye she fell through, so he thought that was fair.

When Holden got back home, up on the Roci, he kissed Naomi, hugged Alex, and went off to find what was left of Miller. The frenzy with which he tore apart the hold to find the node worried his crew, but they let him do it. Eventually he found the tiny scrap of protomolecule.

He launched it into the sun. He thought Miller would have liked the sendoff. He owed Miller for two worlds now.

"See you on the other side."

Holden still wished he knew what Miller had done though.

Over the years he managed not to dwell on it.

By the time he was searching for the lost ships, he found himself actually missing the ghost. Not enough to buy himself a matching hat, but still.

After the rocks fell on Earth, he had no time for old ghosts.

* * *

After Ring had eaten the last of the Free Navy, after Naomi had managed to save them, he dreamed of Miller.

"Well that was pretty fuckin' dumb," Miller said, frowning at him.

"Huh?"

"Not only did you just release a shit-ton of high energy ordnance into a void outside of space time, you also set off a nuclear explosion on the station. And then you fed a fuckin' fleet into the bleed. Something is coming. You're going to need to be ready for it." Miller frowned down at him, and reached out to pat his cheek. It felt like the claw of Miller-bot, and Holden remembered the feel of mandibles in his mouth.

Holden woke up covered in a cold sweat. As he staggered over Naomi to the head, he met his eyes in the mirror; they glowed a soft cyan. His heart stuttered into overdrive as he stared in horror. When he blinked, they were brown again. He didn't get back to sleep for a long time.

When they took jobs for the new OPA, he tried to stay outside the ring. He wasn't always successful, and his dreams in the not-space outside of Medina were full of Miller and strange twisting geometries.


End file.
